Market Preview

Not all the big name directors are only to be found among the one hundred or so invited films to Cannes. There are some heavy-weights with recent films among the more than thousand films in the market as well--John Sayles, David Lynch, Jean-Luc Godard, David Gordon Green, Paul Schraeder and Peter Greenaway. There are also market offerings featuring A-list actors and many actors that are on the downslide. But most exciting for me are five films about bicycling, the most in my ten years of attending Cannes.

The first screens tomorrow first thing in the morning, an English film that was in production during last year's festival and already had posters up promoting it featuring a crazed cyclist and the title "May I Kill U?," and the tag line, "A psychopath on the cycle path."

The next comes two days later, a German film, "The Famous Five." The five are a group of teens who go off on a bicycle tour. It has two screenings, unlike the psychopath film, which only screens once, like two of the other cycling films.

I will only have one chance to see "Allez Eddy!" a day later. This is a Belgian film about an enthusiastic eleven-year old cyclist. It is in the spirit of another Belgian feature from last year that paid homage to cycling deity Eddie Merckx.

Later that day I will have another cycling film, "Girl on a Bicycle," from Germany. It takes place in Paris, by far the most popular city in the films of the festival. I could see two or three a day if I made that my focus. A girl on a bike captures the attention of an Italian bus driver who is engaged to a German.

The best of the five may be "Tour de Force," the story of a forty-year old who dreams of riding in The Tour de France. I'll have to use my most persuasive powers to see it, as the program states it is only available to buyers. Press in particular are excluded. But I will have three chances to try, all in larger market theaters.

A strong theme of films in the market is the search for someone who has gone missing or a biological parent. There are also a few films about soldiers recovering from Afghanistan. There are at least five films about astronauts, the first on Day One with Christian Slater. One of the astronaut films is from Hungary. There are three films about being adrift at sea. "All is Lost" stars Robert Redford and plays out of competition, but not in the market, as are the other two. Patagonia is the subject of a few films, including a mountaineering documentary.

As always there is a wide array of documentaries. There are a couple on Inuits and two on Haiti, one by Haitian Raul Peck called "Fatal Assistance," questioning the aid process. Two recent phenomenoms, Linsanity and Pussy Riot are also the subject of documentaries. One that I have no interest in seeing is "On Tender Hooks," about the practice of piercing the body with meat hooks and suspending one's self.

There are plenty of horror films I will avoid as well, many described as people experiencing the most terrifying night of their life's. "Nothing is what it seems" is a common description of horror and non-horror films alike.

This year's Michael Madsen is Eric Roberts, with four films in the market. It may be the first time since "Reservoir Dogs" that their isn't a film with Madsen. John Cusack is in two quirky films, "Adult World" and "Grand Piano," playing a reclusive writer in one. Gerard Depardieu is also a rare absentee, though his female counterpart Catherine Deneuve turns up a couple times, one in the revival of "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg."

I will certainly have my work cut out for me to see all that I'd like to see. There are no shortage of screenings. There are 76 on day one, a whole festival worth for most festivals, but the least of any day of the festival until it winds down.


The crowds are gathering. Quite a few people already have their ladders and chairs staked out in front of the Palais where the limos drop the celebs off for their walk up the red carpet.

Draguignan, France

Draguignan was the last significant city I passed through on my way to Cannes. It is nestled in rugged, semi-mountainous terrain leaving me forty-five miles of up-and-down pedaling with a final descent from 1,100 feet to the Mediterranean. As in years past, I made my last wild campsite, before two weeks of sanctioned camping during the film festival, at the summit of the final pass off in the forest. I varied the final stretch of my route from years past, staying inland from Draguignan rather than dropping down to the coast as I usually do.

My route out of Draguignan took me past the lone American military cemetery in the south of France.  It is less than a mile from Draguigan's city center, just beyond its official cemetery on Boulevard John F. Kennedy and across the street from the office of the town's cycling club. There was no missing the cemetery with two American flags fluttering high in the sky on poles flanking a huge sculpture of an angel. Though it gave me a small taste of home, there was no mistaking I was still in France with a "no dogs" sign on the grass beyond the entry. Dogs are welcome in so many places in France, including restaurants, those few places they aren't, let it be known. French Fidos and Fifis would certainly love to go romping on the immaculately manicured twelve acres of the cemetery, dodging its 861 headstones.

I was welcomed at the small visitor center by an extraordinarily vibrant English woman who gushed a stream of information. There was literally no holding her back as she recounted the history of the cemetery and WWII lore. She told me there are just twenty-four such American military cemeteries outside the US, scattered in fifteen countries, including the Philippines and Mexico. Only three countries have more than one. Italy and Belgium both have two, while France outdoes them all with eight.

Although American dead were first buried at the location of this cemetery when it was just an open field in 1944 after the initial Allied invasion from the Mediterranean in August of that year, it wasn't officially sanctioned as a military cemetery until 1956. A young French doctor chose the spot to bury the American dead. He is 99 and attended the last big ceremony at the cemetery on May 8 commemorating Europe Victory Day.

I could barely get in a question as the matron of the cemetery rattled on and on. At one point she paused for a breath and commented, "I love my job. When I go home at night, I say 'good night' to all the boys and when I arrive the next day I greet them with a 'good morning.'"

"So it's all men buried here?" I asked.

"No, there's one woman, an in-flight nurse who was killed when the plane she was flying in crashed. One could contribute on the battlefield with more than bullets. There were those who did it with Bibles or bandages, as she did. The average age of all those buried here is 22, but she was 26. When you walk around the cemetery, you'll notice that 24 of the graves are marked by Stars of David for the Jewish soldiers while all the rest have the Latin Cross. There are also two sets of brothers."

I don't think she would have stopped talking if her phone hadn't rung, allowing my to finally take a stroll out to the giant wall that listed all the dead and honored the unknowns and also contained a small chapel. It was a most tranquil setting.

The cemetery was quite a contrast to Draguignan's bustling city center that had been taken over by its annual flea market--another great French passion. Every French town seems to have one. They are such a big event signs advertising a town's "vide-grenier" are posted weeks ahead of time. It gives everyone a chance to unload things they no longer need or to acquire items they think they do need. There is always a frenzied bustle surrounding them.

As I cycled past, I nearly collided with a husband and wife lugging an old, well-used ornate fireplace grill. It could have been a valuable antique or something not much better than scrap metal. They were high-trailing it as if they feared the person who sold it to them might realize he'd let it go for too cheap and might chase after them.

Others were at a near sprint rushing to the market before all the good deals were gone. It is hard not to stop and watch all the action and see all the clutter for sale. I have made purchases over the years, replacing a worn out shirt and also a spoon I inadvertently left with friends I was staying with. They are most definitely a wonderful window to the French.

It wasn't the only one I encountered in my ten-day 700-mile ride. At another in a smaller town a young man was passing out brochures with a photo of the French president Hollande standing in the rain looking very glum. I had been surprised to earlier see similar posters. I at first thought they were left over from the election exactly a year ago that put Hollande into office, but Yvon pointed out that they are being put up by the right-wing party that would like him replaced even though he has four years left in his term.

Once I descended to the coast I was greeted by a round-about decorated with sculptures of golfers, letting me know I had reached a tourist zone. A sculpture in a round-about in Draguignan commemorated the twenty-five people who lost their lives in a devastating flood in 2010.  Some round-abouts are just landscaped and others have a sculpture relating to something a region is known for, such as apples. They are another example of the French making their environment more pleasing and habitable.

And now I have twelve days of cinema from all over the world to immerse myself in. Whenever I have a doubt about which film to see, if one of my options is a French film, I will choose to further submerge myself into the culture of the country where I will be spending the next two-and-a-half months.

Newspaper story in "Le Berry Republicain" May 7

Le Berry Républicain

Passionné par le cyclisme, Georges Christensen est arrivé des États-Unis

Le Berry Républicain     

Georges Christensen fait étape à Bruère, avec son ami français

Georges Christensen, Américain, est de passage en France. Passionné par le cyclisme, il effectue actuellement son tour de France. Il a fait étape à Bruère-Allichamps.
Il parcourt vingt-cinq mille kilomètres à vélo chaque année. Georges Christensen, soixante-deux ans, est arrivé des États-Unis. Il fait partie de Chicago globe-trotter et a débarqué à Paris, vendredi.

Son challenge : rejoindre Cannes en vélo pour assister au festival, en empruntant la route du Tour de France. L'Américain a ainsi fait étape dans le Saint-Amandois, à Bruère-Allichamps, où il a été accueilli par son ami français, Yvon Mevel, qui parle très bien l'anglais.

À Saint-Amand
le 12 juillet pour l'arrivée du Tour
Après une nuit dans une chambre d'hôtes à Meillant, les deux amis ont pris la route pour la prochaine étape du tour. Yvon a accompagné Georges à Saint-Pourçain-sur-Sioule (Allier), ville départ d'étape du tour. Pour ses prochaines étapes, Georges Christensen dormira à la belle étoile. L'homme a pris l'habitude de camper depuis l'âge de vingt-six ans.

Le cycliste a été journaliste sportif, mais comme cela l'ennuyait et il a décidé de parcourir le monde. Il a vécu de petits boulots durant six mois et a économisé pour partir le reste de l'année. Il a ainsi visité pas moins de cent pays dont tous ceux de l'Europe et d'Amérique du Sud.

Lors de ses voyages Georges a rencontré bien des péripéties : une attaque à l'arme blanche en Afrique du sud, une guerre civile au Nicaragua, une tente dévastée par un ours au Canada.

Il vient en France chaque année depuis dix ans pour assister et voir le plus de films possible au festival de Cannes, et faire son tour de France. Car après quelques jours sur la Croisette, Georges se baladera en France, à vélo, pour se maintenir en forme.

En France, Georges allie ses deux passions : le cinéma et le vélo. Par ailleurs, avant son arrivée à Bruère, il s'est arrêté sur la tombe de Jean Robic à Wissous dans l'Essonne. Jean Robic était vainqueur du Tour de France en 1947.

Georges Christensen va rester plusieurs mois en France. Il sera de nouveau sur la route du Tour de France et à Saint-Amand, le 12 juillet. Après son séjour en France, cet homme passionné retournera aux États-Unis et donnera des conférences sur ses voyages dans les universités américaines.

And  the translation by Janina:

May 5, 2013


Bruère-Allichamps, France

Passionate about Cycling, George Christensen has arrived from the United States.

American cyclist George Christensen is traveling though France. Passionate about cycling, he is making his own tour of France. He has made a stage (the Tour de France is executed in stages or étapes which pass through different towns each year) in Bruère-Allichamps. The sixty-two year old cyclist travels 25 thousand kilometers on his bike each year. He left Chicago and arrived in Paris on Friday May 3.

His challenge: to return to Cannes on his bike, attend the festival—he is an ardent cinéfile—and then follow the route of the Tour de France. The American has already made one stage of the tour from Saint-Amandois to Bruère-Allichamps, where he was welcomed by his English-speaking French friend Yvon Mevel.

After a night in a bed and breakfast in Meillant, the two friends set out for the next stage of the Tour. Yvon accompanied George to Saint-Pourcain-sur-Sioule (Alllier) one of the towns from which the Tour de France will depart this year. For the following stages George will sleep under the stars—he has been camping since he was 26 years old.

Christensen began as a sports journalist, but soon decided to travel the world. He gets by with odd jobs and economizes for six months in order to spend the rest of the year traveling. In this way he has visited a hundred countries, mainly in Europe and South America.

During his journeys he has encountered many adventures: an attack in South Africa, civil war in Nicaragua and a tent destroyed by a bear in Canada.

He comes to France each year to see as many films as possible at Cannes and then make his tour of France. After his time on the Le Croisette—the road running along the seaside in Cannes— George will continue cycling around France in order to maintain his form.

George unites his two passions in France: the cinema and the bike. Moreover, before his arrival in Bruère, he visited the grave of Jean Robic, winner of the Tour de France in 1947, in Wissous in l’Essonne.

George Christensen will stay several months in France, and begin the route of the Tour de France again at Saint-Armand on the 12th of July. After his stay in France this bike enthusiast, will return to the United States where he will give lectures on his travels.

Vaison-la-Romain, Ville Depart Stage 16

I left the tourist office in Saint-Amond-Montrond with a 24-page brochure recommending sites to see and food to eat and wines to drink in the province of Berry. Along with the UNESCO World Heritage cathedral in Bourges and several Loire Valley chateaus was the town of Sainte-Severe, where in 1947 Jacques Tati filmed "Jour de Fete," one of the most beloved of French films. I have seen this film of a bumbling bicycling postman many times, including last year here in France under a tent in the town of Gap as part of its weekend bicycle festival. I could see it again at Cannes next week, when it is being given a special presentation at its outdoor theater on the beach.

I had never thought to seek out the town where it had been filmed. I'd head directly there if it weren't on the opposite side of the province from where I was and the opposite direction in which I was headed. But I will have another opportunity next month after I complete scouting The Tour stages in Brittany and will be heading down to Corsica for The Tour start. Even as much of France as I have biked the past nine summers, new fascinating, must-see places keep turning up.

I don't have to worry about running out of first-time Tour Ville-Etapes either. Every year there are always a half dozen or more. Saint-Pourcain-sur-Sioule is one of this year's. It will be the departure city for the 14th stage that will finish in Lyon, the second largest city in France. The Tour is heavy this year with large cities, not something I particularly welcome. It also includes Marseille, the third largest city, and, of course, Paris, its largest by far. Other large host cities are Nice, the sixth largest city, Montpellier, 15th, and Tours, 20th. I don't object at all to Tours, as that's where my friends Florence and Rachid live.

The terrain had been relatively flat the 200 miles from Paris to Saint-Amond, but then turned hilly, making the 58 mile transfer to Saint-Pourcain all the longer and painful. It's not likely I'll be riding ahead of the peloton on the stage to Lyon, but will rather have to take a short cut and duck down to the start of the next stage in Givors outside of Lyon.

Despite hosting The Tour for the first time, Saint-Poucain had done little in preparation for it unlike Saint-Amond. There were no banners or posters around town other than a tattered announcement of the June 15 Jour de Fete ride of part of The Tour route that all the host cities will be offering this year for the first time. There was also a banner across from the tourist office where the peloton will commence the stage.  The next day though in a small town I passed a bike sculpture in someone's front yard such as I would have expected in Saint-Pourcain. It was a mannequin dressed in a postal uniform astride a yellow postal bike, perhaps a tribute to Jacque Tati and "Jour de Fete."

Yellow is the prominent color of France and not only in July during The Tour de France. In the spring time in the northern half of the country there are acres and acres of bright yellow rape seed. Dandelions can also be seen all over, as well as occasional patches of daffodils and tulips and other flowers. Towns vie for as many stars as they can get as a Ville Flueri with their flower displays. During the summer months super bright yellow sunflowers take over the countryside.

I had some severe climbing from Saint-Pourcain to reach the Rhone valley and my next Ville Etape in Givors, just south of Lyons. I camped a couple miles up a long climb down an overgrown tractor trail beside a pasture of cattle. I began the next day with a 25-minute seven per cent climb, a good way to warm up in the cool temperatures. As I approached Givors a group of cyclists slowed for a chat. I told them I was in search of the starting point of the stage leaving Givors. They said to follow them, that it wasn't too far ahead. It was right along the Rhone, already marked. Also nearby was a round-about decorated with painted bicycles and a large wooden sign giving the details of the route. It will be one of the most dramatic of The Race finishing atop Mont Ventoux, and the longest at 150 miles. It will be the eighth time a stage has finished atop Ventoux. The sign listed all eight winners. Also near the stage start was a Museum to the Resistance, another common site in France.

I followed the Rhone for 55 miles, a welcome spell of flat.  Traffic was at a minimum as it was a holiday.  The route was lined with orchards of fruit trees with for easy camping. There were regular pull-offs with a picnic table or two. At one a couple in their fifties invited me to join them in their picnic. Though they had never done any touring, they had biked many of the legendary passes--Ventoux, the Galibier, the Col de Bonnette and more.

They were driving down to St. Tropez for the long holiday. I asked if they knew that Henri Desgrange, the founder of The Tour de France and its director for better than thirty years, was buried near there. They did not. I told them I had visited the grave of Jean Robic earlier in the trip. At that the wife turned to her husband and somewhat derisively said, "He knows more about The Tour de France than you do." Its not the first time I've heard a French woman tell her husband that, evidently not as enamored with The Tour as her husband and tired of listening to him go on and on about it as if he's its ultimate authority.

Realizing what a Tour-obsessed fanatic I was, the husband commented it would certainly be a "catastrophe" for me if The Tour were cancelled because of all the doping. He pronounced "catastrophe" the French style "ca-ta-strof." It is another of my many favorite things of France. It is a word that is commonly used in Tour de France broadcasts and daily life. "Quelle catastrophe" is a favorite French expression that always warms my heart, like "voila" and "alors."

"What about the dopage?" he asked.

"It has always been a part of the sport," I said. "It is very difficult and demanding. It has to be hard for the racers when they are trying as hard as they can to keep up and they can barely do I.  How can they not resort to caffeine or whatever else might assist them?  A great many of the riders claim to have asthma so they can take asthma medication that opens up their lungs and makes them inhale more air and ride faster. There are all sorts of such quasi-legal tricks. One just has to overlook that part of the sport and appreciate what great athletes they are to begin with and the great effort they give and how beautiful the sport is."

I crossed the Rhone at the large city of Valence, as I was in need of a grocery store. There hadn't been an open one the day before, it being a holiday. As I meandered about the city, I happened upon a street named Henri Desgrange, as if I had been led to it. I couldn't have been more thrilled. One of the many charms of France are all the streets named for Hugo, Zola, Balzac, Baudelaire and others of the arts and those such as Desgrange who have brought honor to the country.


It was back into semi-mountainside terrain from Valence as I approached Mont Ventoux. I was also far enough south for vineyards to be taking over the countryside. It was also a region of picturesque villages attracting tourists and cyclists. I added a couple of small cols to my collection. At the top of one of them south of Dieulefit, a village packed with camera-toting tourists, a giant yellow bicycle was already in place to honor the peloton when it comes by in July.

I am writing from Vaison-la-Romain, an old Roman city with a 6,000 seat amphitheater, a 2,000 year old bridge and castle. It is teeming with tourists, many with bicycles, either to make an attempt on nearby Mont Ventoux or just to partake of the fine cycling around it. There will be even more cyclists come July when it will be the start of the stage after the Ventoux stage. It has hosted Tour stages before and is so much of a tourist town that it doesn't need to promote itself as a Ville Etape. It offered not a single Tour-related artifact for my camera.

My Annual Rendezvous With Yvon

 Yvon may be well settled into his retirement, but he is still challenged to equitably distribute his unflagging boyish enthusiasm among his many interests--cycling, travel, table tennis, grandchildren, pétanque, friends, helping his girl friend with her farm, and arranging interviews. Lucky for me he had a couple spare days between a cycle tour out of Toulouse to the Pyrenees and attending the table tennis World Championships in Paris to be able to meet up with me on my ride from Paris to Cannes.

We rendezvoused in Bruere-Allichamps, two hundred miles into my ride and a two hundred mile drive for Yvon from where he is living in the Lot departement. It was a most appropriate spot, as it is one of several towns that claim to be the center of France. According to Graham Robb in his book "Discovering France," three such towns consider themselves the center based on different calculations. I visited them all a few years ago, but learned from the local reporter, who Yvon had lined up to interview me, as he does just about every year, that there are actually seven that make such a claim. The reporter said that the general consensus though is that Bruere-Allichamps is the center. There is an obelisk in the road, just a block from the bar where we were talking, marking the spot.

Yvon hadn't forewarned me that a reporter would meeting up with us, but it came as no surprise. French newspapers regularly run stories on bicyclists doing something out of the ordinary. Yvon feels he is doing his civic duty to alert the nearest large newspaper when we meet up to the presence of an American globe-trotting cyclist who has come to France to follow The Tour de France. This newspaper was "Le Berry Republicain," named for the province in the center of the country.

This was this first time we had been interviewed by a male, and he had a decidedly different slant than his female counterparts. He was interested in hard facts (how many miles I ride a day and a year, how I have earned a living over the years, the number of countries I have biked and so on) rather than the human interest questions women reporters have always asked (what foods I eat, what I like about France, my favorite countries). After twenty minutes of questions he posed us in front of the obelisk, then Yvon and I took to our bikes.

Yvon doesn't camp, so he had booked a room in a four-room bed-and-breakfast in a small town five miles away. It had an adjoining apple orchard where I could pitch my tent, though there were even more inviting forests all about. We had a picnic-style dinner of cassoulet, couscous, ravioli, cheese and home-made pâté from Yvon's girl friend. I also provided a bottle of wine from my Air France flight. Yvon didn't object at all that it was in a plastic bottle.

Yvon wondered what the American reaction had been to the Armstrong doping confession. I said most Americans don't understand the culture of the sport, so were quite appalled. Yvon said the French weren't so angry at Armstrong, but rather at the authorities who never caught him. Some of the most revered French cyclists have served drug suspensions and remain high profile figures in the sport as commentators and coaches. But Yvon admitted his interest in the sport has waned. He hardly watches it on television any more. Rather than watching two hours of a race, he'll just watch the last fifteen minutes, other than Paris-Roubaix, as he has a special relationship with it having ridden a sportif of it with thousands of others. But he brightened considerably saying that none of this has dimmed his or the French enthusiasm for The Tour de France. It is too much a part of the national fiber.

We talked more about table tennis than cycling. It has taken over Yvon's life more than anything. He recently finished second in the Masters category in his departement, the equivalent of American states. He coaches his town's team and is in regular demand for play. He never knows when his phone will ring with someone asking for a match. He is often invited to come down to the police department to play, something he is always happy to do, lessening his concern about being ticketed for running a red light.

He also teaches table tennis at the local school on "Leisure Wednesday," when the teachers have the day off and the students can engage in pleasure activities, including going to the local cinema. There are ten students interested in table tennis, equally divided between boys and girls. The girls are particularly adept at being light on their feet, as Yvon compares the footwork he teaches to dance. And he hopped up from the table to demonstrate for me, gracefully gliding from side to side.

He is excited about attending the World Championships in Paris later this month. The top French player is ranked 27th in the world. He's hoping he will bring him the same good luck he brought the only French player to win the single's Championship in 1992 in Sweden when he was in attendance. Yvon also attended the World Championships the only other time the French won, a mixed doubles team in 1988 in England. The Americans are no threat he said. They have never been very good, and the World Championships have never been played there. The French are strong, but the Germans are even better. It is second to soccer as their most popular sport.

After dinner we took a stroll around town. We were the only ones out on the unseasonably cool night. As all French towns, there was a monument to the WWI dead in the center of town. Yvon pointed out something I had never noticed before, a paragraph from DeGaulle's radio address to the French people from London on June 18, 1940 not to give in to the Germans, launching and encouraging the Resistance movement. June 18 is not a French holiday, as the country already has plenty of holidays, including three in May, but the day is commemorated by veterans taking wreaths to cemeteries and such monuments.

The next morning Yvon accompanied for three hours before circling back to the bed-and-breakfast for his car and his drive home. Our first destination was Saint Amond-Montrand, the arrival city for the 12th stage of The Tour. The tourist office didn't have any brochures yet on all the activities the town would be offering, but the woman at the desk did provide us with a map of the peloton's route through the city and where the finish line would be, by a pyramid-shaped building that is the town's defining feature and serves as an artist's center. That explained the many sculptures we had seen around town and in its round-abouts. She directed us to a round-about the peloton would pass where there was a floral display of a bicycle and also a count-down to the day The Tour would arrive.  It was at 67. Many towns hosting The Tour offer such a feature, illustrating their great anticipation.

Yvon and I biked over to the newspaper office, so I would be able to easily find it when I returned in 67 days, as the reporter said he would like to interview me again about my experience following The Tour. A block from the newspaper office we saw a shop window full of Tour memorabilia for sale. It was the official Tour office, unfortunately closed, as it was a Monday, a day when most businesses in smaller French cities are closed, making up for being open on Saturday. That also prevented me from purchasing a SIM card for my iPad, allowing me to access the Internet whenever I wanted and not having to rely on WIFI, which I hadn't been able to find in two days. In the window of The Tour office was a notice saying that June 15 was Fete du Tour day in honor of the 100th Tour, announcing that each of the Ville Etapes would be hosting a ride of part of the stage that was either starting or finishing in that town. That was big news and something I will have to try to take advantage of. That is two weeks before The Tour starts, so I could be scouting the Alps or the time trial stage near Gap that day.

On our way out to the count-down round-about we passed a crew planting flowers in another round-about, also bicycle-themed. Yvon is quick to have a conversation with anyone. One of the workers said their biggest project was to make a one hundred foot by one hundred foot flower bed in the shape of a heart near the finish line with the town name and Tour de France in the center for the cameramen in helicopters to televise across the world. Yvon and I could see its outline when we went out there. Also nearby was a street named for The Tour de France. Saint Amand has served The Tour as a Ville Etape twice before. The last was in 2011, when the street, which served as the finish line then, was renamed. The French show their love for The Tour in a thousand and one, or maybe a million and one, ways. This was one of them.

We began together the nearly sixty mile transfer to the start of the next stage in Saint-Pourcain-sur-Siole, one of five stage cities in this year's Tour named for saints. I had just learned from the book I was reading, "The Identity of France," by Fernand Braudel, that few cities in the north of France have saint names as that practice didn't start until after the year 1000 when most of the towns in the north were already established. But there are still hundreds of them all over France--maybe not the fifteen per cent that will comprise this year's Tour, but possibly close to it.

As always, my time with Yvon was too short, but still packed with enough fun and enrichment to occupy my thought for days to come. It is never too painful to say au revoir because we know when we meet again we will easily resume where we left off, as if it we last saw each other the day before. I have much that I can be thankful for. Having friends such as Yvon is high on the list.

The Grave of Jean Robic (1947 Tour de France Winner)

Thanks to the pecision navigational capabilities of my new mini-iPad, I was able to hone in on the grave of 1947 Tour de France winner Jean Robic in Wissous, a southern suburb of Paris, directly from Charles de Gaulle airport upon my arrival in France. Ordinarily, I am eager to get out into rural France on the fringe of the airport to recover from my overnight flight. The last thing I need is the frenzy and cacophony of urban traffic in a sleep-deprived state. But I was eager to put the GPS device on my iPad to use and to see if it was as accurate in France as it had been in the US.

It continued to be a wonderful marvel, pinpointing my exact location.  Whenever I was concerned I might have gone astray, as invariably happens in French cities with their not always clear road signs, a quick consultation with the iPad let me know exactly where I was. The blue dot indicating my location not only showed where on a block I might be if I zoomed in close enough, but which side of the street I was on. It was mind-boggling, almost frightening. Though I did lose my way a few times, not once did I spew an expletive or suffer heightened blood pressure as I otherwise would. I could remain calm and collected knowing I was in the safe hands of my iPad. What a great relief.

I was in good spirits to begin with learning that Air France would provide me with a bike box for my return flight, unlike American Air Lines last year. It spared me having to lug the box I flew over with the long walk to the left luggage department and also the small ransom the privilege would cost me to store it there for three months. France does not provide a similar service in Chicago. That enabled me the opportunity to transport a gigantic five foot by three foot box by bike the fifteen miles from my apartment to O'Hare, breaking my previous record of seven miles in Thessolinki, Greece. A nine mile wind from the north helped me to partially sail it all the way out, though I needed a couple of breaks to rest my arm. Still I was able to make the trip in less than two hours, hurried slightly by darkening clouds that let loose a good fall of rain an hour after I arrived. It made for a great start to the trip. Hazardous and difficult though it may have been, it was a much preferable start to my travels than sitting in the back seat of a cab with the bike in a box sticking out of the trunk. It was most satisfying to remain fully faithful to the bicycle, proving once again that one not be dependent on the demon internal combustion machine for transport.

My spirits were also elevated having learned the location of the Wissous cemetery from the information desk at DeGaulle, something I hadn't succeeded in doing before I left. The French are much devoted to cemeteries, so the tourist official did not blink an eye at my odd request, almost welcoming it even without informing her that it related to The Tour de France. I thought maybe she'd exclaim in delight, "Oh, that's where Jean Robic is buried," but he is not that much of a national hero, though he would have been when he won that 1947 Tour. Not only did she print out a map with the location of the cemetery, she provided the buses I would need to take to get there from the airport and how long it would take. It was 91 minutes, about half the time it took me to cover the 35 miles on my bike with a couple of food breaks and a few navigational checks.

Wissous is just north of Paris' other airport, Orly. And the cemetery was right alongside one of its runways. When I arrived at the cemetery an older gentleman was just leaving. He confirmed that Robic's grave was there and directed me to its general direction. It wasn't a very big cemetery, but it was still helpful to narrow down my search. There was only one other visitor to the cemetery while I was there, a young man who was perched on its wall nearest the airport watching the landing planes, another favorite French pastime. I always see such gawkers at French airports, unlike anywhere else in the world. The French do have a fascination for flight going back to hot air balloons, which they pioneered.

There was no bike-related artifact to identify Robic's grave. What caught my eye was a marble engraved photograph atop the grave of Robic wearing his trademark leather helmet. He was one of the few in his era to wear a helmet, due to his phobia for falling. He was a tiny guy, just five feet tall. He was an exceptional climber, but weak descender. His team director would hand him a lead-filled water bottle at the summit of high climbs to help him descend faster.

There was nothing on the grave identifying him as a Tour de France winner, just that he was a champion who loved Wissous. His lone Tour victory came when he attacked on a small hill, taking advantage of his climbing skills, just outside of Rouen, where a memorial marks the site, over 80 miles from the stage finish in Paris on the last day of the 1947 Tour. He overcame a couple minute deficit to the Italian Oscar Brambillia to win The Race without wearing the Yellow Jersey for a single day.  This was the first post-World War II Tour, after a six-year absence. There was enough lingering anti-Italian sentiment for no one to help Brambillia chase down Robic. Brambillia was so upset at his loss, legend has it he buried his bike in his back yard.

Robic did not have much of a career after cycling. He was reduced to reffing at professional wrestling matches, which were a spectacle then as now. The dwarfish Robic would be catapulted out of the ring by wrestlers upset with his officiating.

With this the 100th edition of The Tour de France I was hoping the organizers might include the cemeteries of as many of The Tour winners as possible on the route, making it easy for me to complete my quest of visiting all their gravesites. But that they did not do. I was also hoping they might have thought to establish an official Tour de France cemetery for all its winners and those who have brought glory to this great event, similar to the Israelis interning all their prime ministers in the same cemetery, but that did not happen either.

Of the 59 winners of The Tour, 34 are deceased. Three were WWI casualties, though none in the Second. Four were suicides and at least one was murdered. Another was found dead during a training ride suspected of being killed by fascist sympathizers. Seeking out their graves will be a much easier quest than visiting all the 2,509 Carnegie libraries scattered around the world. The 59 different winners of the 99 Tours so far contested includes Armstrong and Riis. They may have been removed from the official ledger of Tour winners after admitting to being EPO-fueled, but no winner has been named in their stead unlike three other occasions when a winner was stripped of his win--Garin in 1904, Landis in 2006 and Contador in 2010.

I've been to two graves in Italy, those of Coppi and Pantani, and four now in France. Along with Robic, I've paid my respects to the gravesites of Garin, Bobet and Fignon. All have left me with fond, vivid memories, further bonding me to The Tour. They are there to savor whenever I fancy. They are the best of souvenirs that time will not tarnish, only varnish with a brighter and brighter sheen.

After paying my respects to Robic, I biked another thirty miles due south, twenty of them on bustling National Highway 20, perturbing more than a few of the rush hour commuters. I was inflicted with more horn blasts than I will receive in the next three months here. There was no viable alternative with my desire to get out into la France profounde as soon as possible. I turned off in Etampes, a final day Tour start during my time of attending it. I passed through another, Creteil, on my way to Wissous. Fignon had raced for its town's team and a monument had been erected to him there the year of his death. I was there a couple days after its unveiling, so didn't need to try to track it down this time.

I made a farmer's field alongside a small forest my first campsite of these travels. I would have preferred to have been in the forest so the morning's light wouldn't wake me prematurely allowing me to have all the sleep my body needed after only catnapping in an upright position the night before at 30,000 feet, but the forest was thick with nettles. I did not need stinging legs my first night in France. It was cold enough that I was wearing tights, saving my legs in their brief intrusion into the nettles.  Dinner was the last two of the half dozen hard-boiled eggs I brought along with ramen and some cheese and crackers, also smuggled in. My first couscous, the basis of my French diet, would have to wait until dinner number two.

A Final Training Ride for France

I very much wanted to squeeze in another 400-mile training ride before my departure for France next week, but I could only find the time for a two-day 160-mile ride.   Rather than riding up to Appleton, Wisconsin for a bicycling book, I had to content myself with a ride of picking off three stray Carnegie libraries that have eluded me. The first was in Belvidere, Illinois, 72 miles northwest of Chicago. The next was 25 miles south in Sycamore, and the final in Glenn Ellyn, a distant suburb on my return route.

Not only was this ride a test for my legs, it was also a test of the many features of an Apple mini-iPad.  Not only is it a mini-computer, it is a camera, a GPS device, a telephone and more. It was a gift from Janina so we could stay in closer touch. We had no idea of the range of its capabilities. Not only will it make my travels considerably easier not having to search out the Internet, but also finding my way out of labyrinths.  Its highly detailed maps will enable me to pinpoint my location in any city and figure out which roads to take to escape.  It will keep me fully informed of the weather, my altitude and just about anything I need to know. My chief challenge will be keeping it charged.

I have a lot to learn to take full advantage of all it can do. One of the first lessons I had to learn on this test ride was to remember that I now have a digital camera at my disposal. I didn't think to take a photo of the first Carnegie I passed in Park Ridge, eleven miles into my ride, partially because I had already paid it a visit, but mostly because it was as nondescript of a Carnegie as I have come across and hardly warranted a photograph.  Unlike most Carnegies, it had no distinguishing features other than being at a prime location at the corner of Northwest Highway and Touhy, across from the Pickwick Theater and the new much larger glitzy library.  This former Carnegie now houses an Allstate Insurance agency and a hair and skin care business.

The Carnegie in Belvidere was much more worthy of being the first my iPad photographed, though I couldn't photograph its front since I would have been shooting directly into the late afternoon sun. Instead I had to settle on a side shot with its 1987 addition to its right along with its new glassy entrance. Like many Carnegies the original entrance around the corner facing the main street was now closed.

My bike has the bike rack all to itself.  The tall windows in the old building to the left are all topped by a layer of stained glass.

A weathered plaque by the old entrance largely goes unnoticed and unmaintained.

The Belvidere library is simply called the Ida Public Library, named for the daughter of its chief local benefactor.  Her portrait hangs in the Carnegie portion of the library across from a portrait of Carnegie.

The standard Carnegie portrait that was made available to any library that wanted one in 1935, sixteen years after his death in 1919.

Belvidere calls itself "City of Murals."  I had yet to acquire enough of a photographer's consciousness to think to take a photo of any of them, and also because none of them demanded it, not even the one of a Belvidere beauty queen, Judith Ford, who not only earned the title of Miss Illinois in 1969, but went on to capture the Miss America crown later that year.  I felt more inclined to photograph a small sign on the outskirts of the city that announced it was a sister city to Vaux-le-Penil in France, a city about the size of Belvidere fifty miles south of Paris and just a bit north of Fontainebleau. My route south to Cannes next week could well take me through it.  Many French towns are sistered to towns in Germany and England, but only once have I seen a town in France advertise itself as having a sister in the United States.  That was Chamonix with its fellow ski town, Aspen. It is almost equally rare to see a sign in America announcing a town has partnered itself with a foreign town.

On my route south to Sycamore I passed a farmstead that had a soft drink machine by its barn, evidently to serve its hired hands. It was too far off the road to cater to the passing public. It hearkened me back to Japan, the Land of Vending Machines.  If I had had any thirst, I would have swung into the farm to give it a closer look.  But the temperature remained unseasonably cold.  I had not removed a single layer from what I had started out with when I set out that morning with the temperature just above freezing.

Sycamore's Carnegie had an even larger addition than that of Belvidere.  It was accomplished in 1995 and was desperately needed as the town had grown considerably since the original was built in 1903.  It too was fairly seamless, matching the original Lake Superior Red Sandstone.  I had been passing so many silos in the surrounding farm country, the library's dome seemed to be a tribute to them. The reference librarian said that was not intended. The architect of the library, Paul O. Moratz of Bloomington, Illinois,  had earlier designed the Carnegie in Paxton, Illinois with a more conventional dome and he wanted this to be more distinctive.  Time has accorded the Paxton library the honor of being the most notable of the 111 Carnegies built in Illinois.  It is featured on the cover of the book detailing them all, "The Carnegie Library in Illinois" by Raymond Bial.  The Paxton library has the advantage of being one of the few without an addition.

The rotunda is now known as the "Teen Zone."  It has been painted a bright blue and had comfortable chairs for lounging.  The librarian said the Carnegie portrait used to hang over its fire place, but that no longer seemed to be the appropriate place for it.  They had yet to find a new home for it.

I couldn't linger long in the library as the sun was nearing the horizon.  I wasn't particularly weary, even though I was nearing one hundred miles for the day, and most of them into the wind.  I had been riding steadily hoping to reach Sycamore before dark, otherwise I might not have the opportunity to see the inside of the library.  About the only rest stops I had taken all day were to stop at McDonald's to test their free Wifi and attempt a Skype call to Janina while I sat outside eating my own provisions.  We were able to connect several times, but could never hold the line for more than a minute, often cutting out after twenty seconds.  That is something we need to work on. I had no complaints whatsoever though about the iPads mapping feature.  I didn't even need to be connected to the internet for the blue dot to appear on the maps showing my location.  They easily showed me a short cut out of Belvidere and helped me find my turn onto highway 176 in Crystal Lake.  Its only disadvantage is being so much fun to look at it may cut into my reading time.

I brought along a book on a woman's search for the  full story behind the nude model with a strong, almost defiant gaze that caused quite a stir in Manet's masterpiece, Olympia, a book my fellow French devotee Craig had recently read after happening upon it at the Brown Elephant. It was a subject unknown to me, even though it is so significant that Janina devotes a lecture to it in one of her women's studies courses.

I had already made my annual transition from bike books to books about France with Hilary Mantel's novel on the French Revolution "A Place of Greater Safety," written in 1992, seventeen years before she won her first of two Bookers.  It took me nearly a month to wade through its 750 pages.  It paid more attention to the wives and girl friends and mistresses of the principles of the Revolution (Robespierre, Danton, Desmoulins, Marat) than most such books do, even though they were all pretty much accessories to the story, which was her point.  This book would have been no threat to win a Booker.  I did learn a few shreds of information on the Revolution, but I would have been much happier if the book had only been a third of its length.

I wouldn't have minded at all though if the book on the model Victorine Meurent, "Alias Olympia, A Woman's Search for Manet's Notorious Model and Her Own Desire," by Eunice Lipton had been longer than its 181 pages.  I was able to read ten pages or so on each of my stops and then a good hunk more in my tent at the end of the day. It was a fascinating biography, not only of Meurent, but of the book's author.



I camped several miles east of Sycamore, almost half a mile down a side road in a forest that wasn't too boggy from all the rain of the week before.  There was standing water in most of the unplanted fields and all the rivers I passed were greatly swollen and fast flowing.  From Sycamore I could have followed route 64, which turns into North Avenue as it nears Chicago's metropolis, to within a block of my apartment, but I had to make a two mile detour south of it when I came to Glen Ellyn to find its Carnegie.  On the way I passed the Carnegie in St. Charles, also on 64 as was the one in Sycamore, that I visited earlier in the month on my ride to Rock Island.  I had no camera then, so I stopped for a photo this time.

Even though it would have been easy to put in a ramp to make the original entrance to this Carnegie handicapped accessible, it had been sealed off.  No inscription remains on this part of the building identifying it as a library or tempting anyone to enter here as they once did.

The Carnegie in Glen Ellyn had long ago been converted to an administration building for Glenbard West High School just down the street.  It was a flat one story building with a rather blunt glass addition in front.  It was even more mundane and unappealing than the Carnegie in Park Ridge.  They are easily the two least distinctive Carnegies of the nearly two hundred that I have so far visited.

The former Glenn Ellyn Carnegie hardly warrants a photo, but here it is.

Several miles further back on North Avenue I passed Maywood Race Track.  The day before I had passed another of Chicago's horse racing tracks in Arlington Heights on my way out of town. Though they were magnificent structures, I can't ever imagine such tracks becoming something I would search out.

I reached home early in the afternoon thanks to a hearty tailwind, my legs feeling no effect from the day's previous effort. I had no concerns now of being able to meet up with Yvon in France, three days after my arrival, near the center of France at the post office in Bruere Ailichamp at 5:30 in the afternoon.  Usually we meet at a town's cathedral, but Yvon chose a post office this time for our rendezvous.  We have never missed connections.  The most difficulty we had was last year when I struggled to find the road to the home of his girl friend who he was visiting.  If I'd had an iPad, I would have easily found my way.  I have already located the bed and breakfast Yvon will be staying at and where I can pitch my tent in a small nearby village.  Nothing but happy times lay ahead.